1. Field of the Invention
The present invention is directed to three main areas: (1) a computer console simulator, (2) a multi-console system to allow simultaneous control of multiple computer consoles and (3) a system to distribute computer console management to multiple users.
2. Prior Art
In many industries and businesses, large numbers of transactions are processed by computer on an around-the-clock basis. As an example, certain airline reservation facilities may process 1,000 transactions per second. Because of this demand, multiple main frame central processing units for computers are utilized within a computer complex.
Typically, each main frame computer will be connected to at least one console, including a keyboard and display terminal for operations personnel to monitor and control the operation of the system.
The usefulness of a simulator disclosed in this invention may be appreciated from a discussion about main frame computer operations and how they have been changing. This discussion will also cover the different types of computer environments, the function of the operator and operations staff, and the move in the past few years to operations automation.
Main frame computer systems require personnel to handle various tasks related to the computer's operations. In earlier computer complexes, operations staff would be responsible for insuring that jobs (a job would be any task the computer might be needed to do, such as monthly payroll) were started on time and finished properly, that the appropriate tapes and disk packs were available to complete the jobs, and to watch over the operation of the computer in general. As computer complexes have progressed, some of these tasks, such as job scheduling, have been programmed into the computer. Operations staff, however, are still necessary to perform the task of handling resources and watching over the general operation of the computer.
The operations staff's interface with the computer is through the computer console. This console is used to display status messages about the computer system and allows the operations staff to control the operations of the computer. For example, a job running on the computer may require data from a tape. The job will send a message to the operator via the console requesting that the tape be mounted. The operator will then mount the requested tape and inform the computer system, and the job, that it is available by making an entry at the console. Other types of messages displayed may be about errors or critical situations occurring on the computer system. The operations staff must be aware of what each message displayed by the console means and what type of response is required.
Adding to the work load of the operations staff has been the advent of multiple operating systems. Originally, an operations staff would be required to watch over one or two computers that did principally the same types of functions. In today's environments, operations staff may be responsible for multiple computer complexes running multiple computer operating systems. In some shops operations staff are responsible for maintaining systems for various branches of a company, with each branch having some unique data processing requirements. In extremely large shops, such as those run by airlines, many copies of the same operating system are run for various purposes as well as many different types of operating systems. For example, an airline will require computers to handle flight planning, load balancing, and reservations, as well as having development and test systems. Many of these junctions will run on different computers with different operating systems. It will be the responsibility of the operations staff to insure that all of these systems run properly and without any outages (an outage is the time when a given computer or group of computers have failed). The operations staff must be aware of what messages may be issued from a given complex of machines and how to react to them in the most efficient manner.
Along with the added complexity of the computing environment have come more advanced tools for the operations staff. The operator interface has become much more advanced using new PC technology. This technology allows the console system itself to do some of the work of the operator. This type of console management is often referred to as operator or operations automation. It is simply the programming of the new console systems to handle the job of the operator. As the console systems advance, these programs will become more and more critical and more and more complicated.
The simulator presented here is designed to address two problems that have now come to light. The first is the training of operations staff. With more complex and more critical operating environments, operations staff need a facility to train new staff and re-train existing staff. The other area that the simulator addresses is the testing of new automation functions. These functions are becoming more and more complex and cannot be placed in a critical environment without prior testing.
The current form of training for new operations staff is to place them with experienced staff and allow them to learn by experience on actual working systems. Often times new operators may run development or test systems until they are considered to have sufficient experience to be moved to actual working systems. These methods of training are inadequate in that they are very time consuming, require a great deal of supervision, and may not provide inadequate training for all situations. New operators may not be exposed to all types of situations that may occur and test systems seldom reflect the events that occur with online systems.
The simulator can address this problem by simulating an operations environment that allows operators to make mistakes, analyze, and correct them. Critical situations may be created to train new operators on how to deal with unknown or little known situations. The simulator also provides the ability to train existing staff on new procedures before they are implemented. This prevents any confusion when new procedures or staff are added to the complex.
in the case of operations automation, there is presently no adequate method to test new automation procedures. The events that are being automated may never occur in the development environment or development test systems. Neither can automation procedures be allowed directly on online systems since their failure may have severe repercussions.
The simulator addresses this problem by recreating the test events repeatedly for debugging purposes while giving the developer control over the simulated environment. The simulator may also be used in regression testing of automation products to insure they do not effect other automation procedures or other operations of the system.
There is a need, therefore, to provide a console simulator apparatus to simulate an environment for training operations personnel and in order to test operations automation.
Main frame computer systems are large systems such as those used by airlines for reservations. The computers in these systems use a main operations console that is responsible for running the system. The operations staff who use these consoles are responsible for insuring that other users of the computer will have access to the computer's resources and functions. It is from these consoles that each computer in a complex is monitored and controlled. In many cases there are multiple computers running in a complex running multiple operating systems. There may be several computers dedicated to testing and developing new software, there may be other computers dedicated to maintaining accounting and inventory systems, and there may be computers that are connected to outside users for information access. Each of these tasks may require multiple computers and each separate task may require differing operating systems. Each of these computers has at least one and maybe multiple operations consoles. Each operating system will also deal with its console interface in a different way. The operations staff at a computer site may, therefore, be required to handle many different types of situations at any time and possibly all of the time
There have been many efforts to simplify this situation, mostly through software on the main frame computers themselves. In most cases these have not met with great success because of the disparate operating systems being used. Each handles its consoles differently and cannot be combined with other systems. Interconnectivity between console systems from within the different operating systems is a difficult task involving software to communicate between each system and more software to interpret the messages from the other operating systems. These systems become very cumbersome and difficult to maintain. If one operating system is modified it may require major work to the other operating systems, and changing an operating system is a task that most computer sites avoid. Such a change may cause adverse effects throughout the computer system.
Another direction of console software is for operations automation. Many operating systems have been made "smarter" to handle conditions from within the system that used to be handled by operations staff. These software modifications, however, cannot keep "watch" over entire complexes of computers due to lack of connectivity. They also lack the ability to "understand" different operating systems.
All of this leads to a greater complexity of the operations environments. This, combined with a greater need for system reliability and availability, requires more advanced methods for computer operations. Computer users are requiring that their systems be available world-wide, 24 hours a day. Down time for major computer users is measured in thousands of dollars per minute and the cost is rising.
There is a need therefore, to allow multiple main frame computer consoles to be operated from a single work station.
Current main frame processing environments use a single console, usually the operator console, to display messages about the system's status. It is the operator's job to monitor the system through these messages and note any problems that may occur. This type of configuration limits the dissemination of information. That is, if a problem occurs, only the operations staff has access to the information coming from the system to solve it. The problem may be outside of the operations staff's ability to handle. In these cases, systems programmers and others need to be involved in the problem's resolution; however, the information is not readily available to them. To solve this problem requires the ability to spread the information from the operations console to other areas.
There are other problems inherent in a single console system. Another involves new automation techniques that are being created for system consoles. Many new automation systems are run separate from the operating system. That is, they are run on microcomputer workstations and not within the main frame computer itself. These automation facilities will draw more and more resources from the operations console package as they become more sophisticated. If this work load could be spread across other workstations, it would ease many of the problems of operations automation.